


Out with the Old

by SamCyberCat



Category: Free!
Genre: M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-26
Updated: 2017-05-26
Packaged: 2018-11-05 06:01:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,573
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11007462
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SamCyberCat/pseuds/SamCyberCat
Summary: When Kisumi enlists Makoto to help him with a job for Sousuke, he has an ulterior motive of nudging Makoto and Sousuke closer together. This works out better than he expects.





	Out with the Old

**Author's Note:**

> I've been wanting to write this one since I finished the SouKisu one-shot “A Poor Man's Tools”. You can see this either as a follow-up to that fic or entirely its own thing, it works either way. I'm kind of tempted to start a series of vaguely connected SouKisuMako(Haru?) one-shots, but I'm not sure if anyone would be interested in that. Let me know if you are!

Kisumi could tell that Makoto was nervous, but he couldn't figure out why. It wasn't as if Makoto didn't know Sousuke. Sure, they weren't super close or anything, but they'd at least met a few times and seemed to get along. And given that Makoto was a good judge of character, he'd probably already figured out that Sousuke wasn't actually the least bit intimidating, even if he looked the part. Yet as they drew closer to the Yamazaki family's store, Makoto's nerves seemed to shoot through the roof.

“Are you sure they'll want me here for this?” he asked.

“Of course they will. Many hands make light work,” Kisumi replied, “Besides, Sousuke's parents are getting on in years and they probably won't be able to get into the attic as easily. So it'll probably just be us and Sousuke.”

“Then I guess it'd be rude to turn down an invitation to help,” agreed Makoto.

“It would be. But then again, Sousuke doesn't even know I'm bringing you,” Kisumi said.

“What!” Makoto yelped, “But you said-”

“Come on, Makoto, don't be like that. Sousuke is a friend in need and I can tell that you've wanted to get to know him better for a while now. Isn't this perfect?” purred Kisumi.

“Ugh... Okay, I'll go along with it. But even so, you should have just been honest with me up front,” Makoto replied. His ears had turned red, so Kisumi assumed that he wasn't too annoyed by the development.

They'd reached the store now, so Kisumi headed inside with Makoto following behind him. Once they'd gotten through the doors, Kisumi could tell that Makoto was taking it all in, though for Kisumi this store had looked almost exactly the same since he was too young to remember. It was a staple of his short life.

As always, Sousuke's mother was sat behind the counter, looking over her newspaper with a critical eye. When the two of them came through she glanced up, gave a nod to Kisumi and shot a curious look towards Makoto.

“Hey Noriko,” Kisumi said, “This is Makoto. Sousuke knows him. We've come to help him clear out the attic.”

“That's good, he's been huffing and puffing with it all morning. You know where it is, Kisumi,” she said, before she nodded to Makoto, “Nice to meet you.”

“L-likewise,” Makoto replied.

Then Kisumi led him through the door behind the counter that took them to the rest of the house. For most people it was forbidden, but they were used to Kisumi inviting himself in by now. He saw Makoto look back at Sousuke's mother once they were out of the shop.

“The resemblance is uncanny, isn't it?” Kisumi said, “She's super nice though, even if she doesn't take any nonsense. Anyway, we're heading upstairs. Sousuke should be lurking around there somewhere.”

“I don't lurk.”

The voice carried down from the hole in the ceiling on the floor above them, which added an extra degree of doubt to what he was claiming not to do. Kisumi could hardly stop himself from giggling as he took the stairs two at a time to get up to the next floor. Sousuke wasn't visible, but he could obviously hear them.

“Sousuke! Hi!” Kisumi called, “I brought extra help along with me for your big clear out. You're welcome.”

“Help...?” Sousuke muttered.

That was when he appeared within the range of the trapdoor above them, staring curiously down from where he was sat. At the same time, Makoto made his way up the stairs and the two caught sight of each other. In Kisumi's opinion, it couldn't have been a more romantic moment if it had tried, even if both parties did follow it up by looking awkward and being unable to maintain eye contact. Just typical.

“H-hi, Sousuke...” Makoto said, “I hope I'm not intruding. Kisumi said that, um, you could... do with a hand?”

“It's fine, I don't mind you helping out. Sorry if you had to go out of your way to come here though,” Sousuke muttered.

“No, it's only a short train journey from where I live,” Makoto said, “So... um, what are we doing exactly?”

“Throwing crap out,” answered Sousuke. He swung his legs over the side of the trapdoor so he could get a better look at them. Makoto seemed to become quietly more flustered, but Kisumi thought the view was nice. Either way, Sousuke didn't seem to notice and went on, “Haven't had a proper clear out up here since before I was born and there's years worth of stuff we don't need. I'm not sure when I'll be moving out, but when I do, I don't want my parents lumped with all of my rubbish still up here.”

“Sounds good. So which part can we help out with, the sorting or the lifting?” Kisumi asked.

“If you don't mind, I could use a hand to lug some of the bags down,” Sousuke said, “I'll be sorting it all, since it's my stuff, but it'd go faster if I had someone to help move it.”

“Are you sure you don't want me to do the sorting? I'll be a lot more critical than you are. I know how sentimental you get over junk,” replied Kisumi.

“If I leave it to you then there'd be nothing left up here,” Sousuke snorted.

“Is that a bad thing?” Kisumi asked.

“Look, just get up here and lift stuff if you want to be useful. If not then you can clear off,” said Sousuke.

“Move your legs then. We can't get up with you in the way,” Kisumi ordered. He was enjoying this too much.

Sousuke just tutted at him and pulled himself back up fully into the attic. He disappeared from view and the creak from the boards above implied that he'd moved off to another part of the attic. As Kisumi took to the ladder, he could tell that Makoto was hesitating behind him.

“Everything all right?” Kisumi asked.

“Are you sure he wants us here? He seemed a little... put out,” said Makoto.

“That's just Sousuke. Trust me, he wants us here. He'll like your company and he secretly thinks I'm a delight,” assured Kisumi.

“You are not a delight,” Sousuke called, from towards the back of the attic.

“See? He loves this,” said Kisumi.

It didn't seem to put Makoto's worries to rest, but he followed Kisumi up the ladder all the same. The attic itself was entirely what Kisumi expected – dusty and cluttered. Though it was obvious that a lot of the clutter had been dragged about today. At some point, someone in Sousuke's family must have decided it was a good idea to install a window up here and while it did provide some much needed light, that just served to highlight what a mess the attic was. Kisumi noted that there were several bin bags already piled up near the trapdoor.

“Those are for us?” he checked.

“That's the start of it,” Sousuke replied, from where he was crouched at the other end of the attic, pouring over a selection of old toys.

“I'll get on these then,” Kisumi told Makoto, “Why don't you go over there and convince him to part with some of those old memories?”

“But he said he didn't want us to do that...” Makoto whispered.

Kisumi just smirked at him. He knew that Sousuke could hear them, but he hadn't said anything, so he mustn't have been too opposed to the idea. Either way, Kisumi grabbed the nearest bin bag and headed back towards the trapdoor. If Makoto wanted to follow, then no one was going to stop him.

...As Kisumi reached the bottom on the ladder, he noted with satisfaction that Makoto hadn't followed.

So he took his time after that. Once he'd gotten the bin bag outside to the skip that must have been hired for this (or Kisumi hoped so, because otherwise he was imposing on someone else's skip), he took his time before heading back to the attic, stopping to talk to both of Sousuke's parents in turn along the way. Because Sousuke and Makoto were both a bit nervous, so they'd probably need that extra time to break the ice. If Kisumi got back up there and they were sitting in silence, then he could step in and take charge.

But fortunately for him, that ended up not being the case. He could hear their voices when he got to the bottom of the ladder and by the time he'd climbed back up, he could see that Makoto was sat next to Sousuke, deeply engrossed in helping him sort through his old stuff.

“-in that case, you can't get rid of either of these,” Makoto was saying, “It might save space now, but you'll regret it in years to come when you look back and-”

“...I leave you here for two minutes and you're enabling him,” Kisumi laughed, as he went over to join them, “We're trying to get rid of stuff, remember? Be ruthless!”

“Kisumi, don't you remember these?” Sousuke said, as he held up a pair of bike stabilisers, “The first time I took them off was to race Rin down the hill a-and you were clinging to my back the whole time, then we... we crashed, but we still won. Rin was so pissed.”

“Yeah, and I'll remember that without having to keep the stabilisers,” Kisumi pointed out, “It's not as if you magically forget the good times just by getting rid of your old stuff.”

“What if I need them one day? Not just to remember, but to use,” argued Sousuke.

“Look, if you ever need stabilisers for a bike that was too small for you even back then, just buy new ones. Those things are old and rusty now,” Kisumi insisted.

Sousuke and Makoto looked down at the stabilisers. They both knew that Kisumi was right.

“In the bag it goes...” Makoto mumbled, as if he was saying goodbye to something precious from his own childhood.

These two were both far too sentimental for this. If Kisumi wanted to be practical about it then he'd have Makoto taking the trash out while he sits here with Sousuke, sorting through all this stuff. But he wouldn't be able to get Sousuke and Makoto talking that way. So he had to resign to the fact that this was going to be a long day and that he'd have to put his foot down a lot between trips outside.

At least his plan for the two of them seemed to be working, if nothing else. Makoto was the perfect audience to listen to Sousuke's stories, he seemed genuinely interested in all of them. And Sousuke didn't get much of a chance to talk like that. It'd be pointless for him to tell Kisumi the tales of his childhood, given that Kisumi had been involved in most of them.

After a few hours of slow progress, Sousuke's dad told Kisumi he was going to make some lunch and asked him to find out what the other two wanted, then come back to give him a hand. Kisumi didn't bother climbing back up the ladder for that. He shouted up to the two of them.

“Hey, your dad's making lunch! What do you guys want?”

“Just get me a chicken and bacon sandwich from the shop or whatever!”

“Egg and cress for me, please!”

So Kisumi delivered their orders back to Sousuke's dad, not thinking anything of it. He took a bit longer to get the sandwiches then he should have done, because he was told to waste them off from the shop's stock using one of those... handheld scanner things that they used for stock counts and Kisumi had no idea how to work it. After several false starts, he handed it over to Sousuke's dad, who politely tried to show him how it was done. Kisumi was certain that he wouldn't remember, but they had the sandwiches now, so that was what mattered.

By the time he got back to the bottom of the ladder, he could hear Sousuke and Makoto talking again. He was about to call up to them, but then he heard his name come up and curiosity got the better of him. He stayed silent and listened.

“Yeah, me and him go out sometimes,” Sousuke said, “We're not... dating or anything, but I wouldn't say that we're, eh... not dating either. If you know what I mean.”

“I think so,” replied Makoto, “So it's kind of casual? You wouldn't mind if I asked him out sometime then?”

“Knock yourself out, I know Kisumi would like that. He's pretty into you,” said Sousuke.

“Thanks for the vote of confidence. Now if only I could actually get the words out around him...” Makoto said.

“Being blunt helps, I think. But honestly, with me, Kisumi takes the initiative most of the time,” admitted Sousuke, “The trick is to turn the flirting back around on him though. Kisumi thinks he's the smoothest guy in the land, but as soon as someone flirts back with him, he becomes a flustered mess. He loves it.”

Kisumi felt himself freeze up. He'd brought Makoto here today to try to slyly nudge him in the direction of Sousuke, but apparently Makoto liked him? And now he was seeking advice from Sousuke, who seemed to have Kisumi's number a lot more than Kisumi realised. Next time Sousuke tried to flirt with him, Kisumi was going to make sure he didn't become “a flustered mess”. Honestly, the nerve of him...

He had to say something. Yet if he spoke up now then they might know that he'd been listening to them talk about him. Oh god, what was he going to do...?

“...S-sandw-wiches...”

His voice came out in a dull croak. Kisumi almost hoped that they hadn't heard him, but then from the shifting around above it was obvious that they had.

“Bring them up then,” Sousuke called.

So Kisumi hesitantly climbed up the steps, setting the plates down on the edge when he'd reached the top. Both of them were looking at him. They had to know that he'd heard, they just had to. But there was no going back now. Kisumi swallowed his nerves as best he could.

“There... um, there was no chicken and bacon, so I got you egg and bacon instead. Hope that's okay,” he mumbled.

“Sure, that's fine,” said Sousuke.

The two of them came over from where they'd been doing a terrible job of sorting through Sousuke's belongings (and a less-than-terrible job of discussing Kisumi...) and sat next to him, grabbing their lunch as they did.

“How's it coming along then...?” Kisumi asked.

Sousuke tore a bite out of his sandwich, chewed it thoughtfully and then looked at Kisumi. He could tell that something was up, probably because Kisumi was rarely as timid as he was right now.

“How much did you hear?” Sousuke said.

“I-I didn't hear... very much...” Kisumi mumbled. He looked away before he could meet Makoto's eyes; “Just that... um, Makoto likes me and you think I'm easy to flirt with...”

“Kisumi, I-I'm so sorry...!” stammered Makoto, “I didn't mean- ...well, I did mean... I do like you. But I didn't want you to find out by... Oh man, this is such a mess...”

“No, it's fine,” Kisumi said. Somehow people being more nervous than he was gave him confidence, so he looked back up at Makoto reassuringly and shuffled over to sit next to him; “I mean, I like you as well, so of course it's fine. But I thought you were into Sousuke. Half the idea of bringing you here was to nudge you guys in the right direction.”

Makoto gave a weak laugh; “Well... I do s-sort of like Sousuke as well... You two must think I'm a t-terrible person, huh...?”

“Why would we think that? There's no rules saying you can only like one person,” replied Sousuke. His bluntness was helpful right now, Kisumi thought.

“Yeah, but I came here kind of knowing what Kisumi was up to with us and then ended up asking you for advice about Kisumi,” said Makoto, “Isn't that... I don't know, just not something that people do?”

“If it makes you feel any better, Sousuke and me have talked about other people we're into while we're on dates with each other,” Kisumi assured, “We've even talked about you before.”

It didn't make Makoto feel any better. By contrast, he buried his face in his hands and his ears turned so red that Kisumi was worried they were going to catch on fire. When he spoke again, it was muffled through his fingers.

“Why would you both do that? That's just... I-I don't know, but it's something!” he said.

“If you prefer, we could talk about you right now?” offered Sousuke.

“Nooo! That'd be worse!” gasped Makoto. He lowered his hands and shot a scandalised look at Sousuke.

“Don't see how. I mean you know that we like you and we know that you like us, so it's fine, right?” Sousuke replied.

“It feels like... I'm not sure, but like... like it shouldn't be fine? Like we all know some deep, dark secret that we shouldn't know,” insisted Makoto.

“Me being into you will never be a deep, dark secret on any planet,” Kisumi said, even if he knew it wouldn't help, “Besides, even if you do think there's something weird about it, who's going to know? It'll just be between us and the attic.”

“What exactly will be between us and the attic though?” Makoto checked.

“Whatever we do in the attic,” answered Sousuke. Then, practical as always, he added, “But probably nothing too heavy, because the boards aren't that strong and the whole place creaks like you wouldn't believe.”

“We're not getting up to anything in this attic!” Makoto retorted, “Aside from... all the other reasons why not, it isn't as if any of us are small guys. It'd make a terrible first impression on your parents if I came through their roof!”

“You're thinking about it though,” Sousuke teased.

“How could I not think about it? Two of the most attractive guys I know... and me... in an attic, doing who-knows-want... It's not a hard topic to think about!” Makoto wailed.

As much as he felt awful for it, Kisumi couldn't stop himself from laughing. He put a hand on Makoto's shoulder to steady him and then said, “Honestly, Sousuke's room would be a lot more comfortable than the attic, I can promise you that much.”

“But, his family...” Makoto whined.

“They're heading out at seven, if you can hold off for that long,” said Sousuke, “Could be your reward after all the hard work you've done today.”

Kisumi tutted; “You know, I'd almost be with you on that sentiment, except that neither of you have done any hard work today. I've been the one lugging the bags around while you two cry over broken bits of bicycles or whatever. Look, I'm more than up for anything the two of you want to do when your parents go out, but only if we can actually get enough stuff shifted from this attic so we can see the floor.”

“In that case, I'll have this damn attic bare by the time we're done,” Sousuke vowed, “How about you, Makoto?”

“...We should... swap jobs,” Makoto said, “I'm not harsh enough to help you get rid of anything, I can't even sort out my own stuff at home. But Kisumi is. So if we swap places then Kisumi will be able to get through it all quicker, while I carry the bags out. Then we'll have the rest of the evening for... for shameless behaviour.”

“Are you sure you're up for shameless behaviour?” Kisumi asked, “You sound nervous.”

“Sousuke Yamazaki and Kisumi Shigino in a room with me? I couldn't be more sure or more nervous – it's a package deal,” replied Makoto, “But trust me, I want to do this. Let's... make some more memories.”

“Just so long as you don't want to keep any souvenirs to remember it by,” said Kisumi, “Some things are better off in the bin.”

He saw Sousuke's shoulders shake as he tried not to laugh. Kisumi still knew how to get to him, even if they were both crassly immature. Then Makoto got took his phone out of his pocket and it caught both of their attentions.

“Just texting Haru to let him know that I'll be late back,” Makoto told them, “Not that he ever checks his phone, but just in case.”

“What are you gonna say 'having threesome, don't wait up'?” joked Sousuke.

“With Haru and Makoto I wouldn't be surprised,” Kisumi said.

“Just... that I'll be busy,” said Makoto, “No point worrying him over nothing, right?”

“Right,” Kisumi replied.

Even if there was a nagging voice in the back of his head that said maybe this could be something. Then again, even if all it ended up being was an evening of ill-advised sex between three people who were all mutually attracted to each other, that was still something. And if anything more came of it... well they'd cross that bridge when they got to it. Maybe... Kisumi shouldn't hope for that outcome.

...Yet he was hoping for that outcome.


End file.
